[Harp-L] Sitting in with the Mojomatics/Am I really tired of amps?
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- Subject: [Harp-L] Sitting in with the Mojomatics/Am I really tired of amps?
- From: Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Tue, 7 Oct 2008 15:41:57 -0400 (GMT-04:00)
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- Reply-to: Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
On Saturday night I sat in with the Mojomatics, a CT-based blues band that's been together for over 25 yearss, at the invitation of their lead singer and harp player, Manny Foglio. Manny's harp playing is very Chicago-oriented--tube amp (Silvertone 1432) with bullet mic, strong amped tone. After the first set, when I went to set up my gear, Manny offered me the use of his backup amp, a Fender Super Reverb. (You know a harp player is serious about tone when his BACKUP amp is a Super Reverb.) I was sorely tempted--the Audix Fireball V had a big sound through that amp. But I decided to go with my Digitech RP200, and I'm glad that I did.
I had some volume issues at first, but I solved that by diming the volume control in the RP200, increasing the PA mains volume, and dropping the monitor send volume. The monitors turned out to be the only thing feeding back. After that, I had plenty of volume, and a lot of solid sounds to work with. The great thing about the RP--as opposed to any killer tube amp, like that Super Reverb--is that I have a lot of different sounds available, not just one. So I was able to switch from hard amped sounds to clean sounds to my Taj Mahal Fender Twin sound at the touch of a button. I even tried the bypass on the RP200 for the first time at a gig, and was pleased to hear a totally clean harmonica sound with no drop in level through the PA. (The Fireball helps a lot there, because you get a full range of frequencies when you go clean.)
It's great to have an amp with a great sound, and I guess when all is said and done I'll never get tired of amps. But as far as I'm concerned, having dozens of great sounds at my disposal on a gig beats having one. The audience really picks up when a new song starts and the harp sounds completely different from the way it sounded on the last song. For that matter, so do I.
Regards, Richard Hunter
latest mp3s and harmonica blog at http://myspace.com/richardhunterharp
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